Kagara given survival window

Kagara given survival window - The West Australian

Never mind that Kagara is one slip from liquidation, veteran director Joe Treacy yesterday wooed creditors with a vision of the world's biggest lead mine being developed near Broome.

At creditor meetings from Cairns to Perth, Kagara administrators and Mr Treacy yesterday were given six months to sell Queensland assets and develop a restructuring proposal.

A restructured Kagara would be built around a stake in listed offshoot Mungana Goldmines and its ownership of the Admiral Bay zinc and lead project, about 200km south-south-east of Broome.

Mr Treacy said creditors could get shares in a restructured Kagara and potentially benefit from a big demand for a major new zinc and lead mine later this decade.

"It's an asset we should be really keen to hold on to," he said.

Yesterday's approval for holding deeds of company arrangement for Kagara and three of its subsidiaries comes more than a year after the group fell into administration with more than $100 million in debts.

With scattered, high-cost base metal operations in Queensland, the ambitious expansion driven by former chief executive Geoff Day was hit by the reality of weak base metal markets and repayment demands from Kagara's secured financier ANZ.

Administrators sold Kagara's central Queensland assets to Snow Peak Mining for $40 million in January. But they have struggled to sell assets held in its subsidiary Kagara Copper and the sale of northern Queensland assets has been hit by an impasse with Mungana.

However, the administrators yesterday unveiled a deal with Mungana for the offshoot to take 75 per cent of sale proceeds and use them for a partial buyback of Kagara's stake.